Digital Wet Laboratories: Transforming Biological Science with Engaging Blended
9.4 Discussion
Students’ ratings suggest that (1) they felt the digital learning approach was par- ticularly engaging and useful, (2) it helped them improve their skills, (3) boosted their motivation and confi dence levels as well as (4) self-effi cacy. The structured blended approach as well as the alignment with the learning and teaching activities in the practical laboratory was well received, and the way the instructors supported them was useful and strongly appreciated.
Staff were also strongly supportive of the changes (the following comment is from an academic invited to participate in the project):
Thank you for the opportunity to contribute to this project, and I wish you all the best with your endeavours to get more digital materials up and running. It was a huge success.
Another academic noted that the digital wet laboratory enabled a more integrated approach to discussing experimental data generated by students:
The groups’ results are then entered into the main lab computer to be shared with the rest of the class. The results from the whole class are displayed resulting in a discussion of the variety of data collected. The overall results are then sent to all students for their reports
It was interesting to note that students are still attempting to print out all the resources. For instance, students commented that there was ‘too much to print out’.
Over time we have seen less students coming to class with printouts due to the ready access to online access to the material. A teacher commented:
Most students access their prac lab notes via the lab computers rather than printing them out
In one laboratory where computers were retrofi tted, bench space was reduced due to keyboards. A student commented:
Not enough bench space to keep things aside. Digital is really great, however bench space could be maximised
It is hoped with the introduction of touch screen technology will reduce the problem of situating keyboards amongst experimental material.
score (GTS) for each course, we were able to argue that students at the Bundoora campus (Melbourne, Australia) were disadvantaged by not having access to computer resources during their practical classes. We also have students who travel from remote parts of Australia to undertake laboratory classes, and these students may not be able to afford or have access to computers. This argument was successful and a practical laboratory at Bundoora was also transformed into digital wet laboratory for 2009.
It is interesting to note that in 2009, when the Bundoora cohort fi rst performed their practical classes in DWL, the GTS result did not rise as markedly as the City cohort had in 2008. The Bundoora students may have been infl uenced by the fact that the School of Medical Sciences had implemented DWL in other laboratory
Fig. 9.5 Student and teacher discussing experimental results with the aid of computer resources in a digital wet laboratory
Table 9.2 Good teaching scores (GTS) comparing those in the digital lab (city) to the Bundoora cohorts
GTS 2007 (%)
predigital lab GTS 2008 (%) GTS 2009 (%) BIOL 2256 (city cohort,
digital lab 2008)
53 75 post-digital lab 70 a BIOL 2257 (Bundoora cohort,
no digital lab until 2009)
57 53 60 post-digital lab
The GTS is calculated by adding the number of students in a course that ‘agree’ or ‘strongly agree’
with good teaching items on a questionnaire as a percentage of all student responses, so the GTS ranges from a low of 0 to 100 %
a Students commented on slow and unresponsive computers. Requests were made to the Information Technologies Department to address this issue
medicine classes in 2006. There may have been a lack of ‘wow’ factor in this group of students who had already experienced DWL in other classes. It is interesting that one Bundoora student commented:
Why haven’t we had this a long time ago, I mean we have computers for everything else, why can’t we have them in the labs?
A limitation of the evaluation performed on this project could raise the question
‘Are the students’ learning less now?’ Students are required to demonstrate techni- cal capability development through assessment of their performance of techniques.
In fact the ready access to resources helps them practise in class before assessment.
The curriculum is also reviewed by a programme team, and no adverse fi ndings have been reported by those who teach at second-year level. In fact there is anec- dotal evidence that students who enter into our university from elsewhere have knowledge ‘gaps’ and lack of technical expertise. To help these students, the digital materials developed for fi rst-year classes have been embedded into the second year as bridging materials, and we have received messages of thanks from those students.
9.4.2 The Paperless Laboratory
During the introduction of digital wet laboratories at RMIT University, other disci- pline groups such as biology (cell, animal and plant) have been supported with project funds to develop learning resources to be used both in and out of laboratory sessions. The aim of this work was to enable students to progress more effi ciently through the practical sessions so that they have more constructive time in class to digitally analyse their fi ndings and compare their results with those of other stu- dents and those of previous experiments. Too often students take home the results of practical classes only to fl ounder in the interpretation of these fi ndings while trying to write up results out of class. On the conversion of practical manuals to digital manuals, a tutor in cell biology commented:
The digital answer sheets made submission of student work run the smoothest ever. The students really liked them and found them very easy to use. The answer sheets eliminated all need to reiterate over and over what was required for submission.
and
The updated pracs – with errors removed – also made the ‘pracs’ run much more smoothly and the students were much more positive about their experience than they have been in the past.
and
Digital access to the lab manuals also allowed us to update anything on the spot rather than thinking of it and then forgetting to do anything about it…. All up it was a great success.
9.4.3 Electronic Marking of Reports
We are currently piloting the use of electronic devices to mark student scientifi c reports (Berque, Bonebright, & Whitesell, 2004 ; Derting & Cox, 2008 ). As many science classes involve the drawing of observations, moves to electronic reporting have been slow. The availability of pen devices can change this, and so in our phys- ics laboratory, electronic tablets and pens have been provided for students to draw their fi ndings. These electronic fi les can be easily accessed by instructors who also mark up these reports with comments and then send the fi les back to students. In this pilot trial, the turnaround time for feedback to students was reduced signifi cantly compared to the traditional submission of paper reports. This has also been observed by Santandreu Calonge et al. ( 2011 ). A demonstrator noted:
…because they have to have it done by the end of their session and it has to be marked by the end of their session, so it’s really good because I don’t leave the class with any home- work for me. I don’t have to worry about marking them in my own time. It’s just done dur- ing the session and that’s it. So that’s really easy.
Tracking of reports was simplifi ed as students could see the status of their reports from anywhere and at any time.
9.4.4 Online Tutorials
In an alternative offering of introductory microbiology for allied health students where it has been requested that separate tutorials be included in the offering, the large numbers of students have led us to trial online tutorials.
Each week 20 questions were placed online in a discussion forum and these explore concepts introduced in lectures. Students were advised that participation in these tutorials is not compulsory; however, participation in these online tutorials will allow a 2 % upgrade if this will result in a higher grade designation such as distinction upgraded to high distinction and fail upgraded to pass. In order to qualify for an upgrade, students must participate twice in any online forum, and they must participate in two of the six online tutorials. Their participation may take the form of addressing the tutorial question in discussion format that helps a reader better understand the concept at the centre of the question or, in reply to an existing discus- sion, provide new information and alternative explanations that help explore the concept and lead to better understanding.
The tutor participated after the closing time of the tutorial by addressing any discussions that miss the point of the question or to further discuss problems with any discussion threads posted (Flynn, 2012 ). In our evaluation of participation in these online tutorials, we have found around an 80 % participation rate. The main incentive for participation is that the questions on the summative exam are taken from this pool of online discussion questions!
9.4.5 Electronic Glossaries
Students who progress from this introductory microbiology to the intermediate and advanced level microbiology will be performing a number of advanced tests that require interpretation of results. The recipes for performing these tests and guide to interpretation have always been provided as a separate text that students purchase.
Unfortunately many of the tests that the students perform result in the interpretation of colour changes, and the text was produced in black and white to reduce the cost to students.
In 2008 we received project funds to produce a glossary of electronic resources in microbiological methods (GERMM). This project catalogued all tests performed in intermediate and advanced microbiological techniques. Each test description is accompanied by colour photographs of test reactions. Where the name of tests or microorganisms may be diffi cult for students to pronounce, these words are hyper- linked to an audio fi le of the pronunciation (Parsons, Reddy, Wood, & Senior, 2009 ).
The tests were arranged alphabetically and are accessed through Blackboard which was accessible during the practical classes or outside of class for student prepara- tion. Students found this resource invaluable as it is easy to navigate and use and has improved their understanding of the tests and terms used in our discipline. Students commented:
I have only experienced advantages in comparison to former lectures conducted at uni.
I have accelerated learning, better explanation, tools to complete assessment
and
Without the digital learning I probably would have failed!
We are currently exploring how an augmented reality-based learning system could be introduced to help students understand diffi cult concepts (Maier, Klinker,
& Tonnis, 2009 ) and how learning analytics could help use what is learned to revise curricula, teaching and assessment in real time.
9.4.6 Off-Campus Science Labs
There is abundant evidence that it is possible to teach introductory science labs online to large audiences (Gilman, 2006 ; Jeschofnig & Jeschofnig, 2011 ; Smith et al., 2005 ; Stowe & Lin, 2012 ; Udovic, Morris, Dickman, Postlethwait, &
Wetherwax, 2002 ). The excellent guide to resources for best practices in teaching lab science courses online by Jeschofnig and Jeschofnig ( 2011 ) includes an appen- dix describing how to place an introductory microbiology class completely online.
Northwestern University, with support from the Hewlett-Packard Catalyst Initiative and the National Science Foundation, is also offering a collection of remotely acces- sible labs with its iLabs network ( http://ilabcentral.org/about.php ). This addresses one important aspect of such an introductory class in that it can be diffi cult to staff
such large classes with instructors. In the fi rst-year offering of introductory micro- biology, there were around 500 students, and with a ratio of one instructor to 12 students, it was challenging to fi nd that number of experienced instructors. This was somewhat alleviated by offering classes at a variety of times; however, instructors are usually not able to take more than three classes.
We would be reluctant to move down the path of simply dispatching instructions for students to perform the exercises at home. A key component of our classes was that the in-class electronic resources have freed time for instructors to watch student technique and give them instantaneous critical and constructive feedback. Also as mentioned at the start of this chapter, it is important that students be exposed to confi dent experienced instructors and that they have ample opportunities to perform collaborative activities.